Features - Scrap Metals Supplement

Vehicle manufacturers have shown an increasing wil-lingness to use aluminum in a wider variety of components, helping create an overall growth market for the light metal.

While aluminum producers appreciate the ongoing appetite, the sector’s growth also has attracted investors from around the world. The end result for many secondary aluminum furnace operators is an overabundance of competition, even in a growth sector.

The list and map of North American secondary aluminum producers include facilities in a range of sizes operated by companies as large as Alcoa or as small as a one-location family-owned scrap yard.

The list was last published in mid-2015. In the ensuing two-and-a-half years, the changes have not been enormous, but disruption could be on the way in form of a Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing by the company with the most facilities on the list.

Court officials, attorneys, creditors and executives are in the midst of formulating a Chapter 11 reorganization plan for Real Alloy. The Cleveland-based firm was operating 15 scrap-fed aluminum melt shops in 14 cities (13 in the United States, one in Canada) at the time of its bankruptcy filing in November 2017.

Some of these plants have operated for decades under several different ownership groups. No certainty is attached to what a reorganization plan will include, but it seems doubtful that every Real Alloy plant will remain in operation when the company emerges from bankruptcy.

A name change on this year’s list involves the former Sapa Extrusions. In 2017, Norway-based Hydro—which had been a co-owner of Sapa along with the Norway-based Orkla Group—bought out its partner. Hydro now refers to those assets as its Extruded Solutions business area.

Another Scandinavian company, Sweden-based Gränges, has entered the North American market by purchasing two aluminum plants operated by the former Noranda.

Braidy Industries is building a new facility in eastern Kentucky that is scheduled to come online in 2020. Kentucky’s state government offered considerable incentives to attract the $1.3 billion, 370,000-ton-per-year facility, which reportedly included taking a 20 percent ownership stake in the plant.

A “thank you” is owed to Recycling Today readers who helped identify and verify the 100-plus facilities on our list. Changes to the secondary aluminum sector are certain to continue in 2018 and beyond. As well, doubtless other facilities that we did not uncover belong on this list. If you know of one, please contact me by email at btaylor@gie.net with that information.

Editor’s Letter

Columns - Editor’s Letter

The Chinese government’s series of inspections and planned restrictions pertaining to imported scrap materials has provided another reason to wonder whether the volume of cross-border scrap metals trading may recede rather than grow in the years to come.

Nonferrous recyclers in particular may be entering a shifting trade flow landscape in 2018 and 2019. China has for two decades absorbed considerable amounts of red metal and aluminum scrap, but proposed restrictions—if carried out—will affect several heavily traded grades.

China’s government has adopted this “anti-scrap” position while it is still in the midst of needing imported metallic units of some type, whether ores, concentrates, ingots, cathodes or scrap. That has caused some North American recyclers to consider investing to upgrade material with the thought that, in a pure enough form, it still can find a home in China.

Investing to upgrade scrap quality is an ongoing process for established recycling companies, but the proposed restrictions to America’s largest export market likely will provide an impetus to make these investments sooner rather than later.

What often has been referred to during China’s boom years as “the rest of Asia” also is receiving increased attention. In the ferrous scrap sector, 2017 saw Bangladesh, Pakistan and Vietnam emerge rapidly as destinations for scrap shipped from the United States.

Nonferrous traders and processors may soon find themselves sending containers to the same places if prohibited nonferrous grades follow a pattern that is being seen in the plastic scrap sector. While China is phasing in prohibitions on lower-grade nonferrous scrap, its restrictions on some types of plastic scrap in 2017 were essentially immediate.

Figures offered by a presenter at the November 2017 Paper & Plastics Recycling Conference Europe offer insight into a rapid shift in processing capacity and shipping destinations in the plastic scrap sector. According to the freight forwarder’s presentation, in 2016, Europe sent 89 percent of its outbound plastic scrap to Chinese ports. In September 2017, just 46 percent went to Chinese ports, with Malaysia receiving 12.6 percent, Hong Kong receiving 10.7 percent and Vietnam 9.5 percent.

Some nonferrous scrap processors and consumers based in China are conducting due diligence in neighboring nations to follow a similar strategy. They are confident the metal units still will be needed, though providing them may entail some processing and transloading outside of China’s borders.

Scrap processors and traders in North America or anywhere else in the world have shown a steadfast ability to adjust to circumstances, take risks and find the next opportunity. It seems likely the remainder of this decade will provide plenty of opportunities to demonstrate those positive traits.

2018 Scrap Metals Supplement

Supplement - Scrap Metals Supplement

The 2018 Scrap Metals Supplement to Recycling Today covers a range of topics from the growth of micromills to emerging export destinations for ferrous scrap to the future of zorba.

Single-stream success

Custom Content - Custom Content // General Kinematics

Tallahassee, Florida-based Marpan Recycling opened a single- stream MRF in 2011. The company had extensive experience in C&D processing. This experience caused company president Kim Williams to break from tradition and go with the screens he knew could get the job done.

Single-stream system suppliers were all using a disc screen, and it had several disadvantages. “I just thought I didn’t want that kind of screen,” Williams recalls. He found a better way with General Kinematics.

“GK makes a fantastic product. Whatever they do, they do it over the top with the quality they put into it.” – Kim Williams

Collection Corner

Departments - Collection Corner

Green glove

Home run! Major League Baseball (MLB) has named the Seattle Mariners recipient of the 2017 Green Glove Award, which recognizes the MLB club that diverts the highest rate of materials from landfills.

The Mariners earned the Green Glove Award for diverting 96 percent of all waste at Safeco Field from landfills, a jump from 90 percent in 2016.

“We have worked hard over the years to make Safeco Field one of the ‘greenest’ ballparks in pro sports,” says Trevor Gooby, Seattle Mariners senior vice president, ballpark operations.

Sustainable denim

Cone Denim and Unifi Inc., both headquartered in Greensboro, North Carolina, have introduced the S Gene with Repreve, combining the advanced stretch technology of S Gene denims with the sustainability and performance of Repreve recycled polyester fiber.

S Gene with Repreve denimsare part of Cone Denim’s Sustainblue collection of fabrics, which is comprised of denim constructions using recycled cotton, recycled polyester and other sustainable yarns.

Statewide standards

Recycling rules have been standardized across Connecticut where recycling is available, says the Brattleboro, Vermont-based Northeast Recycling Council (NERC).

Robert Klee, commissioner of Connecticut’s Department of Energy and Environmental Protection, says, “We worked closely with recycling coordinators in our cities and towns and the six facilities in our state that accept recycled material to get everyone on the same page. With one set of rules in place everywhere, it’s now easier to provide people with the information they need to recycle more effectively.”

Do you have a unique recycling-focused story that you would like to share? Please send a press release to Megan Workman at mworkman@gie.net.